The 5.8 magnitude quake added to the misery being felt in the Emilia Romagna region of towns north of Bologna, one of Italy’s most agriculturally and industrial protective areas.

Italian firefighters search the debris of a collapsed factory in Mirandola, Italy on Tuesday.

By:Colleen Barry and Alberto ArsieThe Associated Press, Published on Tue May 29 2012

MIRANDOLA, ITALY—Workers at the small machinery company had just returned for their first shift following Italy’s powerful and deadly quake earlier this month when another one struck Tuesday morning, collapsing the roof.

At least three employees at the factory — two immigrants and an Italian engineer checking the building’s stability — were among those killed in the second deadly quake in nine days to strike a region that hadn’t considered itself particularly quake-prone.

By late Tuesday, the death toll stood at 16, with one person missing: a worker at the machinery factory in the small town of San Felice Sul Panaro. Some 350 people also were injured in the 5.8 magnitude quake north of Bologna in Emilia Romagna.

The injured included a 65-year-old woman who was pulled out alive by rescuers after lying for 12 hours in the rubble of her apartment’s kitchen in the town of Cavezzo. Firefighters told Sky TG24 TV that a piece of furniture that had toppled over saved her from being crushed by the wreckage.

The building had been damaged in the first quake, on May 20, and had been vacant since. The woman had just gone back inside Tuesday morning to retrieve some clothes when the latest temblor knocked down the building, firefighters said.

Thousands have been homeless since last week’s quake, which had a 6.0 magnitude and left seven dead.

The two quakes struck one of the most productive regions in Italy at a particularly crucial moment, as the country faces enormous pressure to grow its economy to stave off the continent’s debt crisis. Italy’s economic growth has been stagnant for at least a decade, and the national economy is forecast to contract by 1.2 per cent this year.

The area encompassing the cities of Modena, Mantua and Bologna is prized for its supercar production, churning out Ferraris, Maseratis and Lamborghinis; its world-famous Parmesan cheese; and less well-known but critical to the economy, its machinery companies.

Many of the dead in Tuesday’s temblor were workers inside huge warehouses, many of them prefabricated, that house factories. Inspectors have been determining which are safe to re-enter, but economic pressure has sped up renewed production — perhaps prematurely.

Co-workers of Mohamed Azeris, a Moroccan immigrant and father of two who died in the just-reopened factory, claim he was forced back to work as a shift supervisor or faced losing his job.

Local union representative Erminio Veronesi has demanded an investigation.

“I think that an investigation will need to be opened here to check who cleared as safe these companies to understand who’s responsible for this,” he said.

Premier Mario Monti, tapped to steer the country from financial ruin in November, pledged that the government would quickly provide help to the area “that is so special, so important and so productive for Italy.”

The Coldiretti farm lobby said damage to the agricultural industry, including Parmesan makers whose aging wheels of cheese already suffered in the first quake, had risen to €500 million ($626 million) with the second hit. The Modena Chamber of Commerce estimated that the first quake alone had cost businesses €1.5 million, with no fresh estimates immediately available.

Ferrari, Maserati and Lamborghini, all centred around Modena, reported no damage, and said workers were evacuated and then allowed to go home to check on their homes and families. Lamborghini planned to keep production halted on Wednesday.